Petroleum Act 1998 – Application form for consent to a licence assignment Page 1

Part 1: Tables

S1)Your ref[1]:

S2)Licensees[2]:

/ Licence:
(a) Company remaining[3] / (b) Company joining3 / (c) Company leaving3

S3)Licences/blocks/subareas[4]:

Company name3 / Company number[5] / Old interest[6] / New interest[7]
Company 1[8]
Company 2
Company 3
…

S4)Changes of block (i.e. exploration) operator[9]:

Area / Current operator3 / New operator3 / Company no. / OPOL date[10] / Handover date
Area 1[11]
Area 2
Area 3
…

S5)Partial assignments[12]:

/ To be completed only if S1 shows more than one company’s interest rising and more than one’s interest dropping; otherwise you can leave this table blank.

Subarea[13]:

Assignor’s name3 / Assignee’s name3 / Interest assigned

S6)Fields[14]:

Company name3 / Company number / Old interest / New interest
Company 1
Company 2
Company 3
…

S7)Changes of field (i.e. production) operator[15]:

Area / Current operator3 / New operator3 / Company no. / OPOL date[16] / Handover date
Area 1[17]
Area 2
Area 3
…

Part 2 Questions

S8)Description of assignment:

Enter a brief summary of the transaction (e.g. “Sale of interest in Licence P666 by Company X to Company Y”).

S9)Rationale for assignment

Give a brief description of the reason for the assignment. If the assignee is affiliated to the assignor, state whether or not the assignee is to be sold; and if so, who the buyer is.

S10)Retained interests/liabilities:

If the assignor is withdrawing from the Licence but retaining any interests in any assets or liabilities (e.g. retained non-participating interests, interests in terminals or decommissioning liabilities[18]), give details here.

S11)Controlling interests

Do any Operating Agreements under any Licences affected here confer a controlling interest on a company with less than a 50% equity interest? If so, give details here.

S12)Initial Term Work Programme:

Set down any commitments from the Initial Term Work Programme not yet completed. If you feel that the assignment is likely to facilitate its completion, you should briefly set out your reasoning here.

S13)Fallow acreage

Enter a brief description of the expected effect on any fallow acreage affected by this assignment. Enter N/A if none of the Licences affected cover any fallow acreage.

S14)All changes agreed? (Y/N)

Enter Y or N according to whether or not the assignment and/or operator changes have been approved by all partners whose approval is required. If N, give details of objections.

S15)Pre-emption:

Enter details if this assignment is made pursuant to pre-emption arrangements. If not, what is the latest date at which this assignment can be pre-empted? Note that DTI may decline to consider the application until after that date.

S16)Is the Master Deed to be used (Y/N)?

Assuming the Secretary of State approves the assignment; enter Y if it is to be executed under the terms of the PILOT Master Deed.

S17)Effective date:

Enter the proposed effective date of the assignment. Note that effective dates in the past can raise tax issues, so we advise consultation with the Oil Taxation Office in such cases.

S18)Planned completion date:

Enter the proposed completion date of the assignment. Any consent granted will be valid for three months from that date. We will not consider applications where the planned completion date is a long way off.

S19)Additional information:

Enter any further information you think relevant to this application and which you think DTI should know.

S20)Return addresses:

We send e-consents to both assignor (using the address that the application came from) and assignee. Enter the assignee’s email address. If you want us to send our reply by post, indicate your requirement (and the postal address) here.

[1] Enter a unique identifier of your own choosing.

[2] Enter a licence number in the header row, then complete the lists of companies (if any) who are party to that licence (a) both before and after the proposed transaction; (b) those party to it before but who are to withdraw from the licence; and (c) those who are not party to the licence before but are seeking to join.

[3]Full registered name of company.

[4] Enter the licence number, part-block, and/or subarea that are the subject of this assignment in the space provided on the first line, sufficient for us to know exactly what is proposed. You can enter several different areas here, provided that all the details in S1 are the same for all of them; if not, you need to duplicate S1 as often as necessary to accommodate them.

[5]Registered number of company (if registered overseas, include the jurisdiction)

[6]Enter the percentage interest held by the company before the assignment (for a new entrant it would be zero). Make clear where a beneficial interest is being transferred, rather than the rights directly conferred by the Licence.

[7]Enter the percentage interest held by the company after the assignment (for a company leaving the licence altogether it would be zero). Indicate clearly if the interest is to be reduced to zero but the company is not to leave the Licence.

[8] Enter details of each company with an interest in that piece of acreage, either before or after the proposed assignment.

[9] It is for the Licence Group to appoint an Operator, presumably under the terms of a JOA, UOA or similar agreement, and for DTI subsequently to approve that appointment if it is satisfied by the proposed operator’s competence.

[10] The Offshore Pollution Liability Association Ltd’s acceptance date, as given when the operator joined. Necessary for all drilling (i.e. Exploration and Production) Operators, but not for non-drilling (i.e. ‘Limited’) or onshore Operators.

[11] For each block, part-block, field or subarea to which a change of operator relates, enter the area affected, the full company name of the operator to be replaced, and the full company name and number of the nominated replacement.

[12] If S1 shows more than one company’s interest rising and more than one company’s interest falling, complete S2 with the share that each assignor is assigning to each assignee; otherwise S2 can be left blank. If S2 is completed, each of the companies named must match one of the company names at S1 and the aggregate effect of the partial assignments at S2 must match the overall assignments at S1. Every S2 table must expand upon one of the S1 tables, but it may be that not all the S1 tables need to be accompanied by an S2.

[13] Enter the subarea that this table relates to: must match the subarea in the S1 table (or in one of the S1 tables, as the case may be).

[14] Enter the name(s) of any field, any part of which is covered by any of the Licences to be assigned. Complete as under “Licences/blocks/subareas affected”.

[15] It is for the Licence Group to appoint an Operator, presumably under the terms of a JOA, UOA or similar agreement, and for DTI subsequently to approve that appointment if it is satisfied by the proposed operator’s competence.

[16] The Offshore Pollution Liability Association Ltd’s acceptance date, as given when the operator joined. Necessary for all drilling (i.e. Exploration and Production) Operators, but not for non-drilling (i.e. ‘Limited’) or onshore Operators.

[17] For each block, part-block, field or subarea to which a change of operator relates, enter the area affected, the full company name of the operator to be replaced, and the full company name and number of the nominated replacement.

[18] Note that nothing in any Licence Assignment, nor in the Secretary of State’s decision with regard to such an assignment, has any effect on decommissioning liability under Part IV of the Petroleum Act 1998.